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You make it sound as though I beat her it was a smack on her fat rear to get her attention.
I really do not think that should cause her to react that way.

Hitting a dog teaches a dog to fear the hand and to not trust you. There are better ways to get a dogs attention than to hit her. If you hit me, I'd react that way, too. LOL You want to build a trusting relationship with your dog and hitting undermines that. If you continue, it won't be "if" your dog bites you, it will be "when."

Your hand should be a source of good things, pets, treats, toys, etc. It should never be punishment.

I agree with the others, redirect. Make sure your dog is always supervised and then redirect when you see the unwanted behavior. Replace it with appropriate dog toys/bones/etc. You'll reap the rewards in the end. Good luck.

01-12-2014 05:21 PM

Blanketback

Besides teaching your pup to give things up willingly, you also have to teach your pup what's hers to chew on. That's why I prefer to have a household that resembles a day care - with toys and bones all over the place, lol. I do have certain toys that are strictly for training, but it's easy to keep my own possessions tooth-mark free by providing him with his own things.

01-11-2014 06:54 PM

Packen

Teach the dog "leave it" or "Out" command using play routines while tugging. This way you do not lower yourself in rank and the dog willingly gives up the prized object, taking the tug away without command is stealing in the dogs eyes. Only a lower rank pack member would attempt it and will get corrected by the dog (this is what she communicated by growling).

As your dog is just 10 months old, this feeling is just awakening and will get much stronger if you do not change anything. By teaching the out/leave it command you put her in OB mode and she will willingly gives up the object, now you can remove it and there will be no growls (or bites). She will respect you more.

If you do not change the technique, it will become a fight. If you win, the dog will not like to be with you. If she wins, you will need stitches. Both outcomes are bad.

01-11-2014 03:01 PM

Baillif

One of those things where you have to see the dog to really give a good answer to a degree.

A bunch of the sport dogs I work with will growl on tugs, toys, and whatever else when challenged or just playing around. There are a few that will give a battle roar when flying at you to return the tug that could intimidate the **** out of some people. Some of em roar and show teeth when they are possessing and you move in to steal. It is part of the game.

Oh wow, selzer, will you marry me in a totally I love you platonically way? What you said is dead on, and explains it very very well.

I liken training dogs to teaching young kids, if they've never been shown how to do "x", then can we expect to know "x" already? So the best way to teach your dog (kid/cat/llama/whatever) not to do something is to give them an alternative behavior to do instead. Don't want them jumping up and down, then reward like mad for sitting, and before long they will sit for attention all the time (my current dog is fantastic at it, and always always runs up to people and sits at their feet to get attention). Same goes for chewing things they shouldn't have, teach her something else and make a huge deal about how good she is when she does it, and pretty quickly she isn't going to bother with that rug because there is something so much more rewarding to do.

Your dog was ripping apart a rug? She was doing something highly rewarding, may have been in prey drive, and someone comes up and slaps her in the butt.

Her response is not something I would want. But smacking her again is likely to get you bit. Instead you need to determine how to make her stop the current behavior and then be proactive in how to deal with what happened.

For example, the immediate issue is to get the dog away from the rug and crated so that you could remove the rug or block access to it, so that she cannot continue to rip apart an inappropriate object. I would have said, Eh! My rug! And then I would have called the dog to me, Boogerbutt, Come, Sit. Good Girl! Kennel. I would then have dealt with the rug.

The growl is a warning. You do not want your dog growling at you, but that growl was saying, "Hey! Don't Do That or I will BITE you!" Punishing the growl, might stop the growl, but it doesn't address the problem.

The problem is you have a bitch that is going to challenge you if you push her unfairly -- in her opinion. She may have some resource guarding going on, but maybe not. But you have the start of some problems. It coincides with the infamous teenager stage. But teenager stage/butthead stage generally looks something like this:

Fido, come!
Ah but these butterflies are so much more interesting right now.

Walking through the parking lot, and a little poodle comes from the other direction.

AR AR AR AR AR AR AR AR !!!!!!

Fido! What the heck?!? You've seen dogs before.

Oh yeah that's a dog. right, a dog.

Man in baseball cap comes up.

AR AR AR AR AR!!!!

EH! Fido, knock it off, it's just a man.

Oh yeah! but he could be a bad guy ya know!

Sometimes the teenager stage takes the form of aggressiveness to members of the family, but not usually the main caregiver. And any aggression toward family members, is something that needs to be addressed immediately.

Check out NILIF (Nothing In Life Is Free). Your dog is full of herself, and she needs to work for every thing now. Not all dogs need this, but no more on the couch, on the bed, etc. She is not clear about who is the leader and that has to change.

She needs regular exercise. Get outside with her and bust her fanny! Go for an hour's walk, and then throw the ball in the back yard for 20 to 30 minutes, then do a training session with her.

Training. Training is where you build the bond. It will definitely help to affirm your leadership techniques that you are doing with NILIF. She needs to go to classes, one a week, until further notice, and she needs to work out with 2-3 15 - 20 minute sessions with you every day. Make her brain tired, not just her body. Use lots of praise though. Set her up to succeed and praise her for doing so, and try to make it fun and stop before she is done.

************************************************** *
A slap on the butt is not the best way to manage the situation. But it should not have elicited that response in your dog. We need to be able to do things to our dogs that they do not like, clip toenails, give baths, put meds in a sore ear, dig crap out of their mouthes. But they are also smart. If she saw that slap as punishment, some dogs will object to physical punishment but stand still for something that really does hurt, like cleaning a wound, putting meds in a blown up ear, giving a shot, etc. Not sure what is the case here.

She needs to trust you. That's part of the bond, and that will not come from slaps. You need to make yourself more enticing to her, so that you can draw her away from something rather than go in and remove something from her, at least for now. Even if you have to go to the fridge and get a hunk of cheese for her, You are not rewarding her for doing the bad thing. You are opening the fridge and then getting her attention and then giving her commands, and treating/praising her for that. Then you will put her where she cannot continue to do whatever it was, and then alter that situation. Down the road, when you work on Leave It, when the bond is stronger, you will be able to say, EH! Leave it, and your dog will. But for now, I would not drag her away from something, and I would not drag something away from her. I would entice her away from whatever, get her contained and then manage the situation better.

I told her no and slapped her on the rear, she looked at me and growled I told her no and slapped her rear again and she gave me a real nasty growl this time showing her teeth. :

So, if the slap didn't cause the reaction, what did? If you get physical with some dogs, they will get physical right back. This doesn't imply that you beat your dog. Some dogs will come up the leash with an unfair correction.

Doesn't it make more sense to show the dog what is right? If you communicate to the dog that it is doing something wrong, then show it the right thing to do, there a better chance that the dog will understand. JMHO

David Winners

01-10-2014 12:15 AM

ubctress

I disagree - I think snacking her backside would get that kind of reaction. Your statement doesn't make you sound like the most knowledge savvy dog owner.